The Verdict | 25 years after 9/11: America remembers — but has it learned?

Twenty-five years after the September 11 attacks, America once again pauses to read the names, lower the flags and remember nearly 3,000 people murdered on a morning that transformed the United States and much of the world.

But a quarter-century later, remembrance alone may no longer be enough.

The more difficult question is whether America learned from what followed.

September 11 produced an extraordinary moment of national unity. It also unleashed a global War on Terror that would span presidencies, continents and generations.

George W. Bush invaded Afghanistan to dismantle Al-Qaeda and remove the Taliban government that sheltered it. But his administration then invaded Iraq over weapons of mass destruction that were never found.

Barack Obama eventually oversaw the operation that killed Osama bin Laden, but his administration dramatically expanded America's use of drone warfare.

Joe Biden ended America's longest war by withdrawing from Afghanistan in 2021, but the chaotic final evacuation from Kabul left another painful image in the history of the conflict.

Donald Trump built part of his political identity around rejecting America's "endless wars". Yet 25 years after 9/11, the United States once again finds itself fighting a prolonged Middle Eastern conflict — this time against Iran.

That contradiction becomes even sharper when compared with American public opinion.

A new Reuters/Ipsos poll finds 48 per cent of Americans believe the Afghanistan war was not worth its toll and 51 per cent say the same about Iraq. Just 25 per cent believe the current Iran conflict has been worth it.

The threat came home

Perhaps the greatest transformation, however, is in what Americans now fear.

September 11 focused American attention overwhelmingly on terrorism originating overseas.

Today, 61 per cent of Americans say ideology-driven attacks by domestic extremists pose the greater threat, compared with 34 per cent who point to extremists abroad. When asked more broadly about threats to ordinary Americans, mass shootings ranked even higher.

America spent decades hunting terrorism thousands of kilometres from its shores. Twenty-five years later, its citizens increasingly fear violence emerging from within their own country.

That is an extraordinary reversal.

The people 9/11 never stopped killing

Then there is another legacy — one measured not in geopolitics but in hospital wards.

Thousands of first responders, recovery workers, survivors and residents have suffered illnesses associated with exposure to the toxic aftermath of the World Trade Center collapse. This year's commemoration even added, for the first time, a moment of silence for people who later died from 9/11-related illnesses.

And just days before the anniversary, Mayor Zohran Mamdani's administration released the first 170,000 pages of previously withheld city records concerning air quality and the government's response after the attacks. The release followed years of litigation and campaigning by 9/11 advocates. More documents are expected over the next year.

It creates a striking political juxtaposition.

Former mayor Rudy Giuliani, whose public image became inseparable from his leadership after September 11, has been among Mamdani's fiercest critics. Yet Mamdani's administration is now opening records concerning what City Hall knew about toxic conditions after Ground Zero and when it knew it.

For survivors and families, accountability cannot end with memorial ceremonies.

"Never forget" must also mean never forgetting those who survived the morning but have spent decades living with its consequences.

America's unfinished lesson

There is no denying that America changed after September 11.

Airport security was transformed. Intelligence agencies were reorganised. Al-Qaeda's leadership was devastated. Osama bin Laden was killed.

But America also paid heavily for some of the choices made in the shadow of those burning towers: long wars, expanded surveillance, enormous expenditure, civilian casualties abroad and deep political arguments at home.

A quarter-century later, America is considerably more politically divided than the country that briefly united on September 12, 2001. The Financial Times notes how starkly today's polarisation contrasts with the extraordinary national solidarity immediately following the attacks.

That may be the uncomfortable lesson of this anniversary.

Grief without reflection can become policy.

Fear without restraint can become war.

And remembrance without accountability can become ceremony.

America has kept its promise to never forget September 11.

Twenty-five years later, the harder question is whether it has finally learned from everything that came after.